


Names

by Beth Harker (Beth_Harker)



Category: Newsies (1992)
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Sickness, non-major character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-10
Updated: 2018-11-10
Packaged: 2019-08-21 13:53:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16577780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beth_Harker/pseuds/Beth%20Harker
Summary: Itey arrived in America not knowing a lick of English.  This story is about his struggle to understand the language, and his desire to be known by those he calls friends.





	Names

Boots was an English word that meant pair of shoes, and Mush was another way of saying porridge, but it could also mean soft, emotional - Mushy. To blink meant to close your eyes and open them again quickly. Specs were bits of glass that helped you see, and that was confusing, because Dutchy's best friend was Specs, but Dutchy also wore a specs on his face every day. Itey tried to be painstakingly clear whenever he talked about Specs, because he didn't want anybody stealing Dutchy's specs as a joke, but hardly anybody ever understood him. Every time he said the word, somebody would grab onto Dutchy and take his specs away, and then they would laugh. Even Dutchy himself thought it was funny. 

Itey's own name, at least the name that the newsies had given him, meant that he was a foreigner, and he always would be. It meant that he spoke a language that nobody understood. Even Racetrack, who had been born in Italy, pretended to have forgotten Italian, because he was American now, just like Itey was trying to be.

He tried to search for a better name. One icy winter morning, Itey told the other boys that he wanted to be called Mittens, because mittens were good, and they could make your hands be warm.

"You got it wrong, Itey," said Snipeshooter, dangling his own ragged mittens in front of Itey's nose. "These is called 'asscheek'. Say it after me - asscheek."

Snitch rushed up behind Itey, covering Itey's ears with his hands, before yelling for Snipeshooter to "knock it off" so loudly that Itey heard him anyway, every bit as clearly as he could hear Snipe chanting "asscheek, asscheek, asscheek, asscheek," while he sped out the door. 

"What is the asscheek?" Itey asked.

"It's a part of your body. A bad part. It ain't polite to talk about it."

Snitch made a gesture, indicating that an asscheek fell somewhere on the lower half of ones body, and Itey resolved to find somebody with no morals, and ask them about it later. That wouldn't be hard, because according to Snitch, the rest of the boys at the lodging house only had about half of a moral between them. 

A "snitch" was an untrustworthy person. Itey hoped that Snitch's name had been an accident, because Snitch was his best friend, and Itey didn't know where he'd be without him. Snitch taught him how to read the new headlines each morning, and never lost patience with Itey if he couldn't say the words right away. Snitch had taught him "please" and "thank you", how to count to ten, and how to buy food. 

Snitch told Itey that he couldn't drink wine. He told Itey that his rosary was "pagan" and that pagan was another word for bad. He told Itey that he couldn't stay out late at night, even if some of the other boys did. Those boys were being foolish. 

Mittens wasn't a good name, Snitch told Itey. Neither was "Star", "Summer", "Flower", "Thunder", "Kitten", "Sausage" or any of the nice English words that Itey could think of. Then again, most of the boys weren't named for things they liked. That was an honor bestowed upon a select few, like Cowboy and Pie Eater. American boys were named for characteristics everybody could see. 

"I want you can call me Curling," Itey told Snitch, tugging on his hair, to show that it really was curling. 

Snitch just shook his head, clicked his tongue against his teeth. 

"That ain't no kind of name for a newsie," he said, and that settled the matter. By noon he'd forgotten about it, and was telling Itey about how it wasn't that cold out that day, and he'd be fine as long as he kept on the move. Snitch talked a whole lot more than he listened, but maybe that was just because Itey's English was still so bad. 

When they got back to the lodging house that night, Itey was shivering from head to toe, and he really feared that his Italian blood was going to freeze before his first American winter ended. He didn't mention to Snitch the pain in his throat, or the way he felt like someone had opened him up and filled his lungs with needles and mud. Making Snitch understand took energy, and even then Snitch frequently disapproved, or told Itey, with absolute certainty, that he was wrong. 

Not all English words were good, and not all of them made suitable names, even to Itey, who didn't know much about the topic. "Influenza" was a good example. Over the next three days, the newspapers were full of headlines like "Influenza Sweeping the City: Scientists Blame Cold Front." Sweeping, Snitch explained, didn't mean to sweep with a broom, at least not the way it was being used in this headline; it meant to go everywhere quickly. Influenza was a word that Itey already knew. He even knew all about how it could "sweep". He tugged on Snitch's sleeve. 

"Influenza sweeped my uncle," he explained. He wanted to say that it had been on the boat, when he'd been coming over from Italy, but he also didn't want to say it, because it wasn't a story he was ready to tell. He looked at the paper, and tried not to think of throwing his uncle's body off the boat, after the disease had finished sweeping him to death.

Maybe Snitch knew anyway, because his face softened, and he promised Itey that he would never ever let the influenza sweep him. 

The two of them sold papes all day, until they were sold out, and Itey stumbled into the lodging house after Snitch, struggling to breathe, and wanting to lie down somewhere. Kloppman took one look at Itey, and announced that he was sick. True to his word, Snitch tried to argue with Kloppman that he wasn't, but it was to no avail. Itey was led off to little room, a floor above the room where all the newsies slept. 

~~~~~

Itey was not the only person in the room. Snoddy was tossing and turning in one of the beds. Bumlets, who Itey realized he hadn't seen in about a week, was reading a paper in the other. He looked pale, but better than Snoddy did. He looked up as Itey entered, but didn't say anything. 

"We are sweeped? With the influenza?" Itey asked, looking from Kloppman to the other boys. He thought that it must be true. 

Kloppman's reply was indistinct. It was muttering. It was "my boy" (did Kloppman think that Itey was his?) and "get sleep" (get sleep. get. get a haircut. get lost. get sleep. Itey would try to remember that), and "not to worry" (Itey was very worried already.), interspersed with so many words which Itey just didn't know. He was made to drink water and lie down in a bed with two blankets instead of one. Kloppman checked on Snoddy, said a few words to Bumlets, and then he was gone. 

Itey fell asleep almost instantly. It was strange to sleep in a bed without Snitch's warm body pressed against his. He didn't miss having the other boy's foot in his face, but he missed the heat. 

Time passed. Sometimes Itey shivered like he would never be warm again, and at other times he sweated and tried to throw off his blankets. When Snoddy groaned in his sleep, Itey answered in Italian, not caring if the other boy understood. It was the language that he used to ask for things, water and blankets and help, which always came, and his mother, who never did. 

The world rocked and swayed. Itey was on the ship again, where people had died, bodies thrown into the sea to be forgotten. He tried to eat, though the waves sickened him, because he didn't want to get scurvy on top of everything else. The wind was blowing, the waves rising up like watery hands - giants or sea gods, that threw the ship this way and that with no regard for the ailing passengers inside. 

Boots and Jake joined in the journey. Itey wondered what a Jake was, and concluded that it might be a type of hat. Kloppman (a man who klopped, whatever klopping was) stopped coming. Itey hoped that he was okay. Bumlets was always there, but he was out of bed, bringing water and ice, and whatever else he wanted to bring. 

Sometimes it was night, and sometimes it was day. Snoddy left. The rocking of the boat stilled before the pain in Itey's lungs started to ease. One night Itey sweat so much that he soaked through his clothing. The next morning, he felt tired, but comfortable, more than he'd been in a long time. 

"I think your fever's broken," Bumlets told him. 

"No. I'm not broken. There is no fever."

Bumlets smiled. He nodded, then went on to check on one of the other boys. Itey went back to sleep. 

Bumlets never talked much. Itey didn't know him well, and he wasn't sure anybody did. He began to ask questions, because he was tired and bored, and could not pass his time reading the newspaper like Bumlets did.

"Why are you here?"

It was night time, but Bumlets was still awake, so Itey didn't see any harm in talking. 

"I was sick weeks before you. I caught it from my sister. I can't get sick again, but Kloppman can. He's paying me to take care of things here."

"Old people mustn't be sick," Itey agreed. He found that he liked Bumlets' way of speaking. It was slow and measured. He didn't shout like a lot of the other boys did whenever Itey didn't understand, as if screaming the same words in his ear was what he needed to render them comprehensible. 

That was all they said that night.

They continued to converse like that, a few sentences here are there, spread over days, sparse, but full of easy goodwill. 

"How is your sister?" Itey asked on the first day.

"She's fine. I have sixteen sisters."

Itey's eyes widened, "Again?"

"Sixteen," Bumlets repeated, scratching out the number with a pencil in the margin of a newspaper. 

The next day Bumlets asked Itey whether or not his name was Fortunato.

"Why do you know?"

"You talked some when you were sick."

"Why do you understand?"

Bumlets shrugged. "I don't. Only a few words here and there. My family speaks Spanish."

"Your sisters?"

"Yeah. Them."

Itey wanted to tell Bumlets what Fortunato meant, but he didn't know the English. "What is a bumlets?" he asked instead. 

"It's Kloppman trying to be funny. My real name's Manuel. Mannie, around friends." 

After two days, Itey was well enough to either go back to selling with the other boys, or stay and help Bumlets if he wanted to. Snoddy had decided against it because he wasn't allowed to smoke in the sick room. Itey decided against it, because he didn't think he could stand it if any of the boys died.

"Hey, Fortunato," Bumlets --- Mannie called as Itey was getting ready to go. "Snitch ain't all bad, you know that?"

"He's good," Itey agreed. 

"He ain't all good either. Look. It's like this. He's had a hard time, and it's good he's got a friend, but being his friend doesn't mean you have to do everything he tells you to."

Itey considered this. "I'd like to drink wine," he decided. 

"I'd like to join you, once this," Mannie gestured to the room around him, "is over. Think I'll deserve it by then."

"Yes," Itey answered. The word wasn't adequate, but maybe his smile was. Finally somebody knew his name.


End file.
